My Diaries

A Lurid Tale of Obsession, Depravity, Wits and Attempted Wit

Sun Jun 6, 1999

Winning the Tuned ("Abnormal") Car Contest a few more times?

Anyway, I managed to win the Abnormal Car Contest three times last weekend, out of three attempts. Twice with the GTO'95MR, and once with a more recent GTO twinturbo I happened to have lying aroung. (Actually, I tried it first, way back when, but I was not good enough, so I tried the GTO'95MR, since it is the very lightest, so I went back on the weekend to prove I had improved).

So I ought to have more helpful advice about it.

Feeling comfortable with Clubman R5ii seems key to both Normal and Abnormal Contests. You've got to know when to throw yourself into the first corner so you have lots of margin for error, and won't get caught by "the trap". In the Normal Contest (lost once last weekend by Griffith 500, then won by it, then won by Griffith 4.0), I once sent the Griffith 4.0 into that corner so hard, though, it spun right around. No problem, I was so far ahead the AI cars did not even catch me. I did sort of the same thing with the GTO twinturbo at least once, but the four-wheel drive meant I did not go right around, but just ended up skidding along facing into the corner, and lost only a little time. In both Normal and Abnomal contests, I pretty much "sacrifice" the second-last event (Deep Forest Racing Way ii in Normal, Autumn Ring ii in Abnormal) although I am getting better (less worse) at both of them. In both Clubman and SSR11, you've got to just give up any idea of completely avoiding the walls; just quickly recover, and even use them to your advantage.

So now I've got all six prize cars from the Normal, and three from the Abnormal (the GTO'95MR won the blue Trueno twice, and the GTO twinturbo finally won a '91 Skyline--blue; I won the white Trueno quite a long time ago).

For both GTO's I use 906hp = Turbo Spec 4 plus racing intercooler and semi-racing exhaust, and 1.2 camber, front and rear, and 12F/9R brakes. I use 4.2 final drive, but don't recall or have notes about what the top gear ratio is; something under .800, I think. 4/4 stabilizer, I *think*. I think the springs and damper are left stock. In the best Autumn Ring ii finish, I changed the intercooler to normal, and changed the final drive to 4.5, for that one race only.

Although the lowish camber, identical front and rear, combined with the excessive power and high-speed torque, makes the car very slippery, it seems, probably because of the identical camber settings, to be very predictable in its wild motions.

Apart from the license test cars, the only prize cars I have left to get are the three remaining from the Abnormal Car Contest. At least now I am comfortable enough with that series to play it with my wife and the television beside me.

I'm even contemplating attacking the Abnormal series with a tuned Cerbera tonight.